“This was the largest number of units ever shipped by a smartphone vendor in a single quarter,” Neil Mawston, Strategy Analytics’ executive director, said in a statement.

Worldwide annual unit shipments of Android phones will rise to 451 million in 2013, up from 357 million in 2012, according to an IHS iSuppli. Of the 1 billion-plus smartphones in the world today, Apple and Google smartphones are expected to have a formidable 76 percent of the market in 2012.

“Apple shipped a disappointing 14.0 million iPads worldwide and captured 57 percent share in the third quarter of 2012, dipping from 64 percent a year ago. Apple’s slowdown allowed the Android community to make gains and Android’s global share of the tablet market now stands at a record 41 percent,” said Peter King, Director at Strategy Analytics.

If those figures are correct, it makes the projections of Apple maintaining a 60% market share over the next few years inaccurate.

You don’t have to be an analyst to guess that $200 Android tablets will far outsell iPads this holiday season. That could bring tablet parity as soon as next quarter.